Tuesday, December 19, 2006

My in-laws live in a wonderful senior community. They have the most active social life now -- it's wonderful. They have made some fantastic friends and have some really good times. My father-in-law, Ros, joined the Chorale at their community. They give two concerts a year and practice every week. This past Saturday, we went to their Christmas Concert.

They are joined by a bell choir, JuBELLation, that is directed by the same woman who directs the Chorale. They alternate songs and do two songs together.

It was wonderful! Very traditional which makes sense. They did a "community sing" in the middle which was so much fun. I found myself remembering alto lines from doing the same songs in High School. The picture below shows my father-in-law in the dark glasses with the dark hair.

We took the kids and it was a little long and slow for them but they were very good. My nephew, who is in 5th grade, was also there and also wonderfully well behaved -- including silently entertaining Gage when Gage was just about DONE! I took the kids up to look at the bells after the concert and one of the bell ringers came and talked to us about them and showed us how they worked. He let the kids try bonging them with the mallets they use sometimes. It was so thoughtful. And, I learned something too. Bellringers wear gloves so they don't leave fingerprints on the bells! I figured there was some fancy technical reason why but it's just not wanting to polish them as often! Love the practicality!

Here is a video clip of parts of two songs. First comes the bells doing We Three Kings and then the chorale doing the same song -- albeit a very different version. The songs are just snippets.